An increasing number of vehicular lights employ solid-state emitters, such, for example, as light emitting diodes (LEDs). These lights are relatively inexpensive, are rugged since they do not use a heated filament, and have very long life. Because of these attributes a sizeable after-market has developed to provide solid-state replacements for previously used incandescent lamps. Some vehicular LED lamps are provided as original equipment requiring that the reflector that is mounted to the vehicle chassis as part of the lampset is matched to the original lamp source, and that the vehicle chassis is designed with a space to accommodate a heat sink. The following are known in the art: U.S. Pat. No. 6,773,138 (Coushaine); U.S. Pat. No. 7,186,010 (Coushaine); U.S. Pat. No. 7,588,359 (Coushaine); and US Published Patent Application 2010/0207505 (Tessnow). An obstacle to market acceptance of energy efficient and long-life LED retrofits as an aftermarket product for conventional factory-installed incandescent lamps such as tail and position lamps is that vehicle running lights and taillights are designed as a two-part unit having a light source, conventionally provided by a heated incandescent filament, and a factory installed reflector. In the United States, for example, the photometric light output for such units is defined by SAE standards as exemplified in 49 CFR Part 571. Legal requirements exist in Europe where standards for stop and position lamps are defined by regulations denominated R007 and direction indicator lamps by R006. The following LED lamps are also known: U.S. Pat. No. 7,407,302 (Tasson); U.S. Pat. No. 6,585,395 (Luk); and US Pub. Pat. Appln. 2005/0169006 (Wang).
Accordingly, it would be an advance to provide a solid-state replacement light source whose light output meets necessary government regulations.